2023/24 Hamas / Iran / Palestine - Israel war

kropotkin1951 wrote:

Clearly the people on both sides are electing haters. I have watched many videos and not

That’s true. Hopefully both sides will elect much better political representatives.

Israeli PM says no halt to fighting in Gaza until Hamas returns hostages; The Guardian; November 3, 2023

Israel will continue its offensive in Gaza “with full force” and will refuse any temporary ceasefire that does not include the release of more than 240 hostages held by Hamas, Benjamin Netanyahu has said, rejecting US calls for a pause in the fighting.

The government of Gaza, Hamas, should immediately release the civilians they have taken hostage, especially the babies, toddlers, and children they have taken hostage and their parents and the elderly.

Israel-Hamas war: IDF kills Hamas commander who played key role in Oct. 7 attacks

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) announced that they have killed a commander of a Hamas battalion as of Tuesday morning.

"The IDF eliminated Wael Asefa, Commander of Hamas' Deir al-Batah Battalion," the IDF announced on X, formerly known as Twitter. His elimination marks a significant development in the ongoing conflict.

Officials say Asefa was responsible for sending terrorists into Israel on October 7. He reportedly planned additional attacks after the events of that day, which coincided with the Jewish holiday of Simchat Torah.

"Asefa aided in the dispatch of thousands of terrorists to assault, abduct and murder Israeli civilians on October 7th," the post added.

In the graphic posted to X, the IDF said that Asefa was imprisoned from 1992 to 1998 for various terrorist attacks against Israeli citizens. He was reportedly involved in "the incitement and promotion of terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians and IDF soldiers for decades."

Posted by Andrea Vacchiano

Holocaust survivor saved from Hamas buries son, fears for captive family

'This is a second Holocaust for me,' says Ruth Haran, 87, who has seven members of her family, including her daughter, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, held hostage by Hamas

"This is a second Holocaust for me,” said survivor Ruth Haran, 87, who is reliving a childhood nightmare.

Twice now, she has made it out alive from the inferno.

But the death, the destruction and the fear have all returned and come full circle for the great-grandmother, eight decades after the Holocaust.

Her son and two other family members were killed in the Oct. 7 Hamas assault on Israeli communities in southern Israel. Seven other members of her family, including her daughter, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, aged 3 and 8, were kidnapped in the infiltration and dragged back to the Hamas-ruled Gaza Strip.

“They murdered my son. They took my family to Gaza,” she said Monday in an interview with JNS. “Release them.”

“I’m (nearly) 88 years old,” she said as she burst into tears. “Enough.”

On the fateful Saturday morning of the Hamas attack that became a national nightmare, Haran was alone in her home in a kibbutz in southwestern Israel, which, like more than two dozen other locations in the region, had been overrun by Palestinian terrorists from Gaza.

She had moved to Kibbutz Be’eri five years ago to be near her son, Avshalom, after her husband passed away, and was also dealing with health issues, including a bout of cancer.

“My son organized a good home for me, in a charming place,” she recounted. “The kibbutz was so beautiful with flowers and views.”

But that morning after the sirens went off indicating incoming rocket attacks, Haran realized something was very wrong. She tried to reach her son by phone but got no answer. Next, she tried her daughter-in-law; again, no response. Her grandchildren didn’t pick up the phone either.

Someone knocked on the door, and she opened it to find two Hamas terrorists in front of her. They were suddenly called away and shut the door.

“I hadn’t seen anything yet,” she recounted. “I didn’t understand what was going on.”

Later in the afternoon, she ventured outside her home (“How long could I wait?” she asked) and was quickly told to go back inside by two security men, instructing her to remain in her sealed room.

She hid out in her home throughout the day, still oblivious to the murderous rampage that was going on outside her house—about 10 per cent of the kibbutz’s 1,100 residents were being massacred. She had the TV on but couldn’t grasp what was being said. It would be 14 hours later before she would be rescued.

It was already nighttime when rescuers came into Haran’s home, which, like her life itself, had been inexplicably spared. They took her to a nearby field with other survivors.

“Everything around was damaged and destroyed,” she recounted.

But the worst was yet to come.

At the field, neighbours who had survived the massacre talked of death and murder, women raped and young children killed.

“Everything came back to me,” she recounted.” The whole trauma (of my childhood) was reopened.”

“It was exactly a Shoah,” she said using the Hebrew word for Holocaust, “because only in a Shoah are babies brutally murdered out of pleasure, women, pregnant women, killed or raped, homes burned.”

She would later find out that her son Avshalom, 66, was among the dead. His cell phone, which she had tried to reach him on in vain earlier in the day, was answered by someone in Gaza.

Her horror did not end there.

Haran would also learn that seven members of her family, including her daughter, grandchildren and great-grandchildren, aged 3 and 8, were taken to Gaza and have not been heard from since.

Two other distant relatives visiting from the suburb of Evanston, Ill., outside of Chicago, were later released.

Her granddaughter, who was forcibly taken to Gaza, had long been involved in an organization that brought ill Palestinians from Gaza to Israeli hospitals for medical treatment.

For years, Palestinian labourers had worked on the kibbutz, she said, eating in their dining hall and working in construction, even on her own kitchen.

Today, one month after the attack, the kibbutz, which remains a closed military zone, is, in part, a tableau of carnage, testimony to the death and destruction that struck the desert farming community that autumn holiday weekend.

“I can’t stop crying,” Haran said in a one-room flat, where she has been temporarily relocated, at a retirement centre in Beersheba. She was lying in the bed under a green blanket before getting up to do an interview with JNS sitting at her bedside.

Ruth Haran was born in Bucharest, Romania in 1935, the youngest of four children. Her mother told her she was born unlucky because the winds of the Second World War were already stirring.

Her Polish-born father, who was a doctor, was exiled from Romania because he was not a citizen. Her mother was left to tend to the four children alone as violence against Jews mounted.

Later, her mother would take the children in search of her husband. They were eventually reunited after a family member, a train conductor, spotted the father on a train. Her father was given a position by the Communists in a hospital in Odessa, but they had to flee yet again from the approaching Nazis.

Haran recalls the freezing, starving nights on a train during their escape. After years of being on the run, eventually, the family made their way by train and boat to Uzbekistan where they stayed until the end of the war.

In 1945, her father, who was appointed to lead the medical team in Kishinev, died of typhus.

“And now the same thing has happened to (my son) Avshalom on the kibbutz,” she said, the tears streaming down her face anew.

After her father’s death, Haran’s uncle sent the family money to get back to Romania from Russia. In 1947, the family immigrated illegally to Israel, when the British still ruled what was then Mandatory Palestine, and had severely limited or otherwise completely prevented Jewish immigration.

She remembers coming over on the boat, being given mandarin oranges and then seeing the Bahai Gardens in Haifa. “I thought I was in heaven; it was so beautiful,” she said. The family shared a flat with two others in the northern port city.

“We were so happy that we had a country and that we had a state,” she said.

Even as they flourished in the Holy Land, life was never easy. Over the decades, two members of the family perished in Israel’s wars.

“I admire Israel,” she said holding back her tears. “I am happy to be Israeli.”

“I didn’t witness the (Nazi) death camps, so it was worse for me now.”

“As a child, we ran away and did not have a home,” Haran said. “This time I will not run away again. I will return to my home.”

“In the fall, the sunflowers will bloom in the kibbutz, and it will be even more beautiful than it was,” she said. “I want to go back home.”

Israel to begin daily 4-hour pauses in military operations in Gaza

Israel has agreed to move forward with daily four-hour pauses of military operations in areas of Gaza. The move appeared to formalize a pattern of halting the violence to allow humanitarian aid to flow into the enclave and to allow civilians to flee away from the fighting.

For the past several days, Israel has paused violence for hours-long windows where it allows civilians to evacuate south. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu insisted in a statement Thursday evening that there would be “no ceasefire” without the release of hostages held by Hamas.

There never was any video evidence of Dominion rigging the election. Unfortunately there is a huge amount of video evidence of Hamas perpetrating terrorism against Israelis, Palestinians, Arabs, Jews, Muslims, Christians, agnostics, and atheists.

Israel's Defence Forces uncover CCTV footage showing bloodied victims of Hamas' October 7 attacks being hauled into al-Shifa hospital hours after troops allegedly discovered a 55-metre-long tunnel under the complex

Uncovered CCTV footage appears to show victims abducted by Hamas during the October 7 massacre being hauled into Al-Shifa hospital in Gaza City.

The surveillance footage shows bloodied victims - believed to be Thai and Nepali migrants taken hostage by the terrorists - being carried into the hospital on gurneys. They appear to have been severely injured by Hamas fighters.

The video, which was released by Israel's Defence Forces (IDF) on Sunday, was captured at Al-Shifa hospital the day that Hamas launched its attack on Israel.

It comes as the IDF, who have been carrying out an operation at the medical complex over the last week, said it had found a 55-metre-long underground passage 10-metres below the ground.

Israel has long claimed the hospital - which is the largest in the Palestinian enclave - functions as a command complex for Hamas, with a network of tunnels running deep below used for both ammunition storage and planning.

The CCTV footage showed one man with his face blurred being brought in on a stretcher by several individuals, at least four of them armed, while in another someone struggles to resist while being forcibly dragged into a building resembling a hospital. 

In the background, doctors can clearly be seen walking along the corridors and the time stamp on the video shows it was filmed at between 10.56 and 11.01 on October 7, the day of the attacks.

In a statement the IDF said: 'These findings prove that the Hamas terror organisation used Shifa Hospital on the day of the massacre itself as terror infrastructure.'

The IDF says it has notified 'relevant authorities' about the footage.

Further images released by the IDF from the surveillance cameras at Shifa show Hamas terrorists inside the hospital, and outside the rooms of the hostages, as well as stolen IDF vehicles brought to the medical centre.

The IDF also releases an info-graphic showing the locations near the Shifa complex where the bodies of cancer patient Yehudit Weiss, 65, and Israeli soldier Cpl. Noa Marciano were found several days ago.

IDF Spokesman Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari says Cpl. Noa Marciano, 19, who was held hostage in an apartment in Gaza City, was killed by Hamas, and not an Israeli airstrike.

He added: 'Noa was kidnapped to an apartment next to Shifa Hospital. During the IDF strikes in Gaza, a Hamas terrorist who was holding her, was killed.'

Citing a pathology report and intelligence information, he said Cpl Marciano was wounded by an IDF strike, and later taken to Al-Shifa, where she was murdered.

In another video released Col Elad Tzuri stood on a rubble strewn street near the hospital and said:' We are here in the area of the Shifa hospital; I want to show you where we found the body of Noa Marciano of blessed memory.

'From the hospital where she left to this house, which we arrived at under the direction of the Israeli Security Agency.'

Then walking up a slight slop to a wrecked two-storey building he added: 'We knew she was in the area of the house in the backyard,' before stopping and pointing to an orange stretcher.

He said: 'We searched here for days until we found her on this balcony.'

It comes as the IDF on Sunday released shocking footage revealing what it claims is a huge Hamas tunnel buried deep below the Al-Shifa hospital. 

Officials said it had found a deep staircase equipped with 'various defence mechanisms' including a blast-proof door with a firing hole claiming the terror group were using the entrance to block out Israeli forces. 

Palestinian officials at the hospital have denied the claims and insisted the complex is used solely for medical reasons and in recent days it has become a shelter for refugees. 

As the war enters its seventh week, the hospital has become a central location in the bloody conflict. 

Since beginning its operation in the area on Wednesday, the IDF said it found the bodies of two hostages - Marciano and Weiss - in a building next to the hospital. Officials say others were most likely kept there.

Earlier in the week the force claimed an entrance to another tunnel shaft had been discovered but tonight marks the first time any video  has been made public. 

It was also revealed on Sunday that troops had allegedly discovered a white Toyota pickup truck containing 'RPGs, explosives, grenades, AK47s,'inside the hospital compound 'identical' to those used by Hamas during the October 7 attacks. 

The footage comes just hours after Israeli forces said it found 35 tunnel shafts throughout Gaza and raided the luxury homes of Hamas terrorists, seizing various weapons.

Providing an operational update on X, the force said: 'IDF and ISA forces revealed a significant 55-meter-long terrorist tunnel, 10 meters underneath the Shifa Hospital complex during an intelligence-based operation. 

'The tunnel entrance contains various defence mechanisms, such as a blast-proof door and a firing hole, in an attempt by Hamas to block Israeli forces from entering.'

Daniel Hagari, the IDF's military spokesperson, said the entrance was uncovered when a military bulldozer knocked down the outside wall of the hospital complex.

Soldiers then found a fortified shaft with a spiral staircase descending deep under the complex before reaching a blast door.

Mr Hagari said his troops are yet to open the door over fears it would be booby trapped.

Israeli intelligence, however, suggests that either the tunnel would either split or there would be 'a big room for command and control'. Forces will instead continue to search the area looking for shafts from nearby houses. 

The Israeli army first entered Al-Shifa hospital on Wednesday, claiming 'around 2,000 people were inside'. 

Hundreds of civilians and health workers were forced to flea the hospital on foot on Saturday after Israeli troops ordered an evacuation on loudspeakers.

Health officials in Gaza said 450 patients had been left inside the hospital after the army was warned many were too sick or wounded too escape.  

Earlier on Sunday, paratroopers from the Nihal Brigade backed up with tanks, airforce jets and armed with rocket launchers launched a series of raids in the heart of Gaza city.

Six weeks into the war against Hamas after the attacks left more than 1,200 people dead on October 7, they carried out operations in the Sheikh Ejlin and Rimal neighbourhoods.

Officials said the areas were 'upmarket' and where senior figures in the terror group lived and footage released showed soldiers attacking buildings with tanks and rocket propelled grenades.

Following the operation, items seized were put on display and they included guns, ammunition, rockets and lap tops and other documents which were being examined by intelligence chiefs.

In addition, 35 tunnel shafts were discovered and a training camp used by Hamas military intelligence was also stormed with 'several terrorists' killed.

The Rimal neighbourhood is considered the luxury district of the Gaza Strip, where senior commanders of Hamas lived and used the civilian space for activity and directing terrorism.

Within the area there are also military posts and government buildings.

IDF forces from the Nahal Brigade located a terrorist squad that was about to fire on the troops from the roof of an apartment and a jet was called in to strafe the building.

A major from the Brigade said: 'During searches of the Rimal area, we located a large number of weapons belonging to Hamas terrorists, including laptops, memory devices and technical documents.

josh wrote:

I thought that IDF propaganda post would never end. 

Sounds like you can’t refute the content of that post.